Ok, so this is right up there with the weirdest thing we’ve ever seen in our past almost-three-years as bloggers. Recently a reader (thanks Sara!) wrote alerting us that she had seen photos of our living room and guest bedroom on a vacation rental site called Airbnb. And apparently the “landlord” was claiming that they were photos of their house in Pasadena- and charging $48 a night with priority to anyone who booked it for one or two weeks straight (to the tune of $336 to $672) since they “received so much interest.”
Isn’t that weird???? What happens when people get there and it doesn’t look like that? Or maybe it doesn’t get that far because it’s all a scam and this person takes the money and runs without providing an address? Either way we were adequately skeeved out. And of course we contacted both the webmaster of the site along with the “landlord” to let them know that those images were ours and they were firmly planted in Richmond and not for rent. Pretty soon thereafter they were removed. Whew. But so odd right?!
It ranked up there with the time that another reader (thanks Michael!) wrote to us shortly after our big bathroom reveal to tell us that they saw some girl named Amber on Rate My Space claiming our bathroom after photos as hers.
The good news is that it was getting great feedback. But the bad news was that it wasn’t her bathroom! The funniest thing about that situation was that Amber was answering questions about the paint color and where she got things (all of which were wrong, so we were totally confused to see her claim that our $100 Overstock sink was a $400 splurge from Kohler and that the walls were some shade called Cucumber Dream instead of the actual Dune Grass hue that we used). Isn’t that weird? Of course we just commented under the post with a link to our site saying “Wait- that’s actually our bathroom! You can see where we got everything and how it all came together by following this link.” Literally within a minute the post was removed.
Actually now that we think about it, the Rate My Space thing might have been stranger than the room rental incident because the room rental person seemed to be in it for the money, so the idea of a scammer stealing a photo and trying to make some loot with it kind of makes sense. But isn’t it odd that someone found a photo of our bathroom and thought it would somehow be rewarding to claim it as their own on Rate My Space (where there’s no dough on the line)? Maybe she didn’t feel like redoing her bathroom so she thought using our photos would be a shortcut? Or she thought it would be funny? Consider us stumped.
Thank goodness for all of our lovely readers who have eagle eyes and thoughtfully email us every time they see our casa somewhere that it doesn’t belong. We’re used to hearing that our pictures are on eBay or Craigslist when someone’s trying to sell an identical rug or duvet. And we even saw before and after photos of our front yard on some landscaping guy’s website in Texas (so crazy, right?!). But the latest Rate My Space and vacation rental listing have been the most odd by far. What do you guys think? Can you figure out some ulterior motive for the Rate My Space thing? Have you ever seen your photos somewhere they didn’t belong? Do tell.
Alison says
My mom once told me that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery – don’t know about outright scamming though. ;) I’m glad ya’ll took the time to set them straight.
I agree – the “rate my space” thing is weird. It’s actually heart-breaking that some people need attention and validation from others and will do anything to get it.
Not that I blame them, ya’ll do an FANTASTIC job. You have inspired me (and countless others!) so much. We just bought our first home in Sept 09 and we have done everything from painting almost the entire house (2 rooms left to go!) to building a coffee table, to laying our own wood floors. Now when people talk about hiring out their projects, I totally think of it as cheating. ;) Taking labor cost out of our budget has allowed us to do so much more for our home!
Edie says
I’m constantly astonished by these brazen people! A few months ago the design firm I work for had a project featured in a pretty prominent magazine. The only problem was that, in addition to quotes from our team, the editor included a lengthy interview with an ex-employee of the firm. The person had quit long before we started the project, but claimed to have worked on it from beginning to end and spoke all about the design process! It was so bizarre, and really made me question the integrity of the designer and the writer.
Korie says
I honestly cannot understand why so many people are such compulsive liars! Boo on them! And your idea of commenting on the bathroom picture with your link was a brilliant idea :)
Nick says
Funny, I stumbled onto this today:
http://dallas.craigslist.org/ftw/sks/1798746972.html
YoungHouseLove says
There’s our patio! Man, I hope all those images aren’t stollen from people!
xo,
s
Arielle says
This kinda thing happened to my FAVORITE blog Katie Did (http://katiedid.squarespace.com/) except some creep stole all the pictures of her adorable little girls and claimed they were her own. It freaked her out so bad that she hasn’t posted anything since March :( Atleast you guys just know they are just attention seeking creepers. Hopefully no one steals pics of Clara (although I do alway wanna reach through the screen and pinch her little cheeks! :D
Shannon says
That is the funniest thing I have heard of!!!! And the wierdest, but still very funny…
Janny A. says
Doesn’t that scare you a bit? there are some weird (sick) people out there. As bloggers do you have any kind of security measures towards your pictures?
YoungHouseLove says
Hey Janny,
What matters most to us is that we take care to keep our house safe and secure (you can read all about that here). Seeing our photos without a credit back to our site can be odd or frustrating, but it’s nothing that truly makes us feel threatened or in danger. And because in 99% of all cases our photos are used with our permission and displayed with a link back to our site, incidents of picture “borrowing” are few and far between (and always easily resolved)!
xo,
s
priscilla says
I am a realtor and this has happened several times. It’s always someone from Nigeria, who lifts photos of nice homes I have listed and puts them out as rentals. He sends back nice emails to anyone who asks and tells them how he, his wife and kids have owned the home for years and how much they love it and hated to move. He says its for rent and requests first and last months rent. I emailed him, told him to immediately remove it and that I had reported him to police and FBI (which I did). It was gone in a minute. The problem is that these crooks just open other emails and do it again. So anyone renting anything should only go thru a reputable agency.
Rowan says
Have you looked into digimarcing? It is a way to put a digital mark that is not visible like a watermark on the actual photo image, but is embedded in the metadata. It is an option given through PhotoShop or independently.
https://www.digimarc.com/solutions/dwm.asp
It allows you to trace the use of your image anywhere.
YoungHouseLove says
We’ve considered digimarking but aren’t sure if it’s worth the extra time (we upload lots and lots of images, so on top of cropping and sizing them it would be another step). But perhaps if “image borrowing” becomes more of a problem for us we’ll consider it. Thanks for the suggestion!
xo,
s
Laura K says
Sorry to hear this happened to you. I had a scary situation a few years ago when my home was listed with a realtor for sale (we’re in Richmond, too). Someone pulled all of my pictures from the MLS listing and then posted it for rent on Craig’s List for very very little money per month. The ad encouraged interested parties to come by and check out the house, then to mail a deposit to some address overseas. Don’t you know that we had tons of knocks on the door from strangers (scary in and of itself), but even worse – we had people complaining they had paid a deposit and they had a right to our place. We explained they had been victims of a scam, and I felt terribly, but there was nothing we could do. Classic case of if it sounds too good to be true…
So when I emailed the contact person for the Craig’s List ad complaining, it was taken down immediately. Scammers moved on to the next place. Best thing we can do is be alert and think critically I suppose…
Cat says
Your patio isn’t just on Craigslist. I checked the properties of the image on Craigslist, and it came back to here:
http://bffhomeservices.com/pavers_retaining_walls_patios_walkways.html
From their Contact Us on the site, you could contact Torrey Massey [email protected] and request your image to be taken down.
Did I mention that is one snazzy patio? Purrrrr!
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks for the heads up Cat!
xo,
s
Melinda says
I’ve never had someone steal my images online, but I have had people literally steal my ideas or something I said and pass it off as their own- even right in front me! If someone puts another person’s image on their blog- they should make sure they state where the image is coming from and even link it back to their website.
Linnea says
I’ve heard of a case when a whole blog was ripped off. Every bit of content just blatantly copied and re-published under a different name. Now, this lady is a professional writer and her blog pretty well known, but that certainly didn’t stop whoever it was trying to pass it off as theirs. From what I’ve heard, this is a problem in lots of creative businesses, everyone from photographers, stylists, make-up artists, designers, writers and so on is having their stuff ripped off and others claiming it as their own work. A make-up artist I know says she has seen one of her images in countless portfolios, even people who contact her for assistant work. Like she wouldn’t know her own work when shown it.
Jen says
That is super bizarre. Especially when your home & renos have been featured not only on your own blog but in national magazines…! Wow.
jja says
Couple of times some cheap newspapers took without asking my travel reports with photos, signed and their own and probably took that day off since I worked instead of them creating that article.
Shevon says
Yes, imitation is a great form of flattery, but trying to take credit for something you had nothing to do with, is just wrong. Unfortunately, there are so many people like this. I wish everyone had integrity and gave credit where it was due.
Quisha says
Yes, AirBnB is very strange. I tried to find a place to visit NY for New Year’s and no one ever contacted me back and when they did it turned out to be a scam. I’ve complained to them and via Twitter and I guess this is something that they are working on. Such a shame.
I guess it’s a compliment ;)
danyelle says
I know people steal photos and put them as their own on match.com. I mean really isn’t the girl going to know that is not you when you meet for the first time on your date.
carissa says
you should start using a watermark on your photos. it is really easy to do in photoshop… you can look up a tutorial on youtube.
carissa says
oh whoops, I didn’t notice that you had said you don’t want to do that! sorry, just an idea =)
Jennifer S. says
OK, so I read this post last week and thought it was so strange & creepy that someone would use pictures of YOUR house. Then today I was on craigslist and BAM! It’s your basement! Not nearly as creepy as someone trying to rent out a room, but weird nonetheless!
http://dallas.craigslist.org/dal/fuo/1804152141.html
Jenny says
That is so creepy/weird, but it sounds like you both are good sports about it! I’m not so sure if I would be! I also always wonder about you guys–has anyone ever found your house in Richmond or knocked on your front door to say hello?
YoungHouseLove says
Nope! Thank goodness.
xo,
s
S. Shaw says
I read this the day you posted it and thought “how strange, who would do that?” Then I saw this today:
http://austin.craigslist.org/fuo/1809616114.html
Anything in this posting look familiar?!
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks for the heads up!
xo,
s
Marta says
Perhaps you’ve already been alerted to this one, but The Nest is ripping off your photo too!
http://ideas.thenest.com/decor-tricks/decor-style/Slideshows/5-secrets-to-a-sexy-bedroom.aspx?page=2
At least they think your bedroom is sexy, haha.
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks for keeping an eye out for us, Marta! We actually gave The Nest permission to use our pics back when they featured our house tour, so this one is okay! But we’re happy they think it’s sexy too, I guess.
http://ideas.thenest.com/decor-tricks/decor-style/Slideshows/amazing-home-makeover-sherry-john.aspx
-John
tiina says
that is just weird, unbelievable rude and wrong in any possible ways!